It would appear that the Lyle fight is a huge gate to finishing a run of this game. Jiseed has done most of the research on this already, but there are a few things I want to confirm about the fight.
-
Rhys does get healed before the fight. Don't waste time to top him off.
-
There is no out-speeding him. Unless you level Rhys up to 14, you're most likely not going first.
2a. Though the Steel Sword will out-damage the Sword, it will only do so by 3 points per hit, making the fight last just as long (still a 4 hit fight). The extra defense provided by the Steel Sword doesn't help much either. That being said, low damage rolls can make the Sword go up to 5 hits, in which case it is GG anyway. The Steel Sword, on the other hand, would almost always guarantee a 4-hit fight. There's the drawback is you lose the money that would otherwise be spent on a Steel Armor, which would cause Lyle's normal attacks to do 15-16 damage instead of 13-14 (see note 3). Those two points can make a huge difference in this fight.
2b. In THEORY, even if there was a way to get any item you wanted (such as the PStar2 Inventory Glitch), at Level 8, you would still need Orakio's Sword in order to one-shot Lyle, or two Royal Needlers. Two Royal Knives or a Royal Sword would not finish him in one shot unless Rhys had high damage.
2c. In THEORY, if there was at least a glitch that could give unlimited money, two Royal Needlers could be bought in Hazatak before going to the Western Cave in Aridia, plus it would give you enough speed to go first.
-
Having a Sword and Steel Armor would bring Lyle's normal attacks to about 14 damage per hit. You can give Lyle's Boots to Rhys to decrease the damage by 1. A Steel Sword alone brings Lyle's normal attacks to about 16 damage, or 15 if you have the Boots equipped.
-
A Steel Knife/Shield combo would make the fight slower without generating much more in defense (Rhys would only deal 9 damage per hit). However, Steel Knives can cast Shu, I am just unsure as to what level at this point and if it would even be worth it.
-
The biggest problem isn't Lyle's attack, it is Zan. His Zan is approximately at Level 6, and with no current way to mitigate Technique damage (see note 7) and no way to manipulate (currently) the damage rolls, this is by far the biggest problem.
-
As far as safety goes, a Level 10 Rhys with fair stat gains with a Sword, Steel Armor, and Boots would have possibly about 58 HP and could 4-hit Lyle reliably. One could potentially take two medium damage Zans and still be able to Dimate your way out. Gaining levels won't help make the fight quicker, but it will make it safer with higher HP.
-
This brings me to an interesting hypothesis: It is believed that the Intel stat affects TP, and while that have some merit to it (though it makes no sense because Rhys, Lena, Nial, and Sari all have Intel but 0 TP), I believe it could in fact help to mitigate technique damage. My reasoning behind this is that I tried playing out a battle with a Level 1 Rhys vs. Lyle. Lyle's Zan constantly hit close to and over 30 HP damage. However, in looking at the video of my run, my Level 11 Rhys was taking close to 23 damage from Lyle's Zan. I will test this at some point by getting a hex editor and ramping up Rhy's Intel by a crazy amount to see if it helps.
In conclusion, the fight currently is an RNG crapshoot and can make or break a run. Generally, if a runner can get past Lyle, they are home free. Until some glitches are found or some more information/strats are discovered regarding stats, this fight will always be a barrier.
